Bitch Media - GSAhttp://bitchmagazine.org/taxonomy/term/5241/0
enSchool's Out: The Real World?http://bitchmagazine.org/post/the-real-world-education-feminism
<p class="MsoNormal">I met up the other day with a new friend for coffee who explained she was a little late because she'd been stuck on the phone being lectured by her big sister about getting a "real" job this summer and what it's like for "everyone else" in "the real world." Exasperated, my friend explained that not only was her planned summer position good—albeit short term—professional experience, but that she didn't buy into the idea that our working lives, should we be so lucky to have them, should be constant drudgery. The mark of responsibility should not be feeling bored out of your mind. So what if you don't make as much money, she said, as long as you get to travel, have adventures, take on different roles at different times? This "real world" versus school talk is setting up a false binary! I couldn't agree more. The frequent implications I hear that my job is in some imaginary land separate from the "real working world" can start to dig at the ol' self esteem. To be constantly devalued as "<em>still </em>a student" can shake a person's belief in themselves and their work.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Okay, you can see where I'm going with youth and education, but what does this have to do with sexuality? Well, for one, university campuses have long been bastions of critical thought around gender and sexual justice. To be sure, I can think of innumerable microagressions I've witnessed, including at least one official human rights case at my own university that proves the path ahead still has no end in sight. But we can also look back on a history of second-wave feminism powerfully catching hold on university campuses and we can observe the way campuses have often made a home for the many PIRGs (Public Interest Research Groups) across Canada and the U.S. By virtue of the fact that universities host humanities and social sciences programs, they foment ideas about gender, sex, and sexuality that become some of the driving forces of larger public discourse. Seems real to me!</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Not only is it insulting to imply that our lives at school—whether we're educators or students in elementary, secondary, undergrad, or grad schools—are only a prelude to real life, but it's disheartening for those of us who have found crucial networks of support in Gay-Straight Alliances or in campus organizing like pride projects, safe(r) space projects, queer student and faculty associations, and others. Some of these, like the <a href="http://levanacentre.wordpress.com/about/">gender advocacy centre</a> and the <a href="http://queersatqueens.ca/contact-us.php">education on queer issues project</a> that I've found at my university operate often <em>in spite of</em> the austerity measures of administrators who would prefer to run the university on the capitalist model of lucrative business in the relentlessly competitive "real world." (Forgive me here, I'm about to get sarcastic.) So what does "real life" hold for those of us who like to inhabit those school-related contexts where it's taken as normal for people to be queer-positive? How should we reconcile the fact that a lot of us who are among the very engaged when it comes to political struggles are expected to eventually leave this preparatory phase and get out into the harsh light of reality where those political battles are going on, but where we can expect the people we meet to be…what? Jaded and apathetic about it?</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Apparently, we have to get an education in some land of make-believe shot through a vaseline-covered lens in order to get a "real" job, and then endure the "real world" where we won't have it so easy, and then, at some undisclosed point in the future, "it gets better"? If we don't expect the level of community and political engagement that is growing all the time at all educational levels to translate into "real life," then how are things going to get better? Are people suddenly going to start taking seriously the labor laws that compel companies to give perfunctory seminars on how not to sexually harass your coworkers? Probably not. I think it's going to involve breaking down some of the boundaries between "school" and "work" that treat theorizing and activism and even a little naïve enthusiasm as immaterial to the way the rest of the world works. Many of the academics, artists, and activists with whom I have the pleasure of working every day are frequently brainstorming ways to make more community connections and be accountable to non-campus communities. But for these links to take hold, it may be necessary for perceptions to shift in some parts of the community side of things, too. For a lot of us, making these connections aren't just motions we have to go through in order to get a degree—which is not to minimize the way that such relationships can involve significant power imbalances owing to "expert" status, among other things. I also don't want to minimize the other privileges that many of us have who are lucky enough to live in the ivory tower, so to speak. But it's important to recognize that these privileges (of such factors as class and cultural capital, which therefore create spaces that are still dominated in the upper echelons by non-racialized bodes—read: white men) exist in ironic tension with infantilizing stereotypes about school work not being "real" work.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal">I know that when people use this "real life" terminology they're probably seldom thinking about the absence of GSAs and positive space committees in their workplace. They're probably mis-remembering student life as freedom from responsibility or as one big party punctuated by sleeping in till afternoon classes. But that's not giving much credit to the awful lot of us who commit to the hard work of thinking and caring, even if we do it on an irregular schedule. (This job has some serious perks but there are many weeks when I long for a 9-5 job that I could walk away from at the end of the day. But there I am, writing draft after draft of a paper on the first warm weekend of the season and trading pillow talk for hashing out dissertation ideas with my partner as we fall asleep—lucky for me, she's an academic, too). Anyway, my point is that the school vs. "real life" discourse <em>does </em>perpetuate a sense that what we do as students—whether it's organizing a pro-choice protest or creating a course schedule that avoids having to wake up at the crack of dawn—is a luxury we won't be able to afford once we find a "real" job.</p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><strong>Previously:</strong> <a href="/post/amnesia-and-the-other-education-feminism">Amnesia and the Other</a>, <a href="/post/of-sexts-and-sex-textbooks-feminism">Of Sexts and Sex Textbooks</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/the-real-world-education-feminism#commentsGSAIt Gets BetterPIRGsschool vs. thesexualitystudentsSocial CommentaryMon, 19 Mar 2012 18:28:24 +0000Sharday Mosurinjohn15899 at http://bitchmagazine.orgSchool's Out: Activist Quandaries and the Benefit of the Doubthttp://bitchmagazine.org/post/activist-quandaries-and-the-benefit-of-the-doubt-feminism
<p><img src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7196/6941701157_0e2f23083b_o.jpg" alt="A picture of a yellowed page on which is typed &quot;the function of music is to release us from the tyrrany of conscious thought&quot;" height="166" width="223" align="left" hspace="10" />I had a jam session with a good friend of mine last night. I love these sessions. Music is what keeps me feeling like there's sense and meaning when the world threatens to prove otherwise. During a break, he started recounting the tale of some past gig that was either a hilarious failure or an epic success (you don't remember the ones in between, he said). We were talking about song choice, and of the songs his band played, he said, "was so gay," but it was a crowd pleaser. I raised my eyebrows, cuing him to backpedal, and the conversation abruptly took a political detour.</p>
<p>There are about 20 years between me and this buddy of mine. He told me that this is language that's been around since he was a kid, and it ain't going anywhere. Besides, it doesn't have anything to do with the speaker actually making a connection between homosexuality and their use of the word gay in that moment. I argued that it is the resonance between that word and a history of socially sanctioned homophobia which gives the slur its painful punch (see also: <a href="/post/the-transcontinental-disability-choir-what-is-ableist-language-and-why-should-you-care"target="_blank">ableist language</a>). He conceded this may have been true at some point, but not anymore. But the danger, I said, is precisely in the fact that now a social hierarchy is maintained without requiring the component of individual actors who are personally hostile toward gays.</p>
<p>I elaborated that there are still huge debates about this kind of language, and that it's very much an issue which is still being discussed. A lot of young folks today realize that sexist and homophobic language correlates to real differences in the material and social resources available to them due to the interplay of their sexuality with other practices and identities, whether these are real or ascribed to them by others. They're forming GSAs, they've been instrumental in changing legislation, and they're making connections between overtly phobic sexual slurs and the much, much subtler forms of construing social worth, according rights, and being folded into structures of power. At this point, in the scholarly literature, among activists, and even (<a href="http://www.egale.ca/index.asp?lang=E&amp;menu=1&amp;item=1533">mostly)</a> in Canadian state policy, debating the significance of the word "gay" as a slur is far from the front lines of the public conversations around discrimination on the basis of sex, sexuality, and gender. While this issue hasn't lost its importance, the debate has shifted from <em>whether</em> discrimination against sexual and gender "minorities" happens, to much more complex ideas about and responses to the ways in which inequalities have been bureaucratized and routinized. What I wanted to say, but felt I couldn't without giving a longer history than I had breath for, is: you're not the first person to argue there's no relationship between the "gay" slur and homophobia. <em>We're on that next shit now</em>.</p>
<p>My friend took my points. He resolved, on his own initiative, to pay attention to his language and to do the same with his friends and his kids. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, choosing to believe that growth is possible, and I felt genuinely good that when we encountered a point of great tension, we talked about it in a way that advanced an appreciation of justice and came out still friends on the other side.</p>
<p>This felt to me like one small moment of anti-oppressive success, but I've also been reading through some of the latest Internet Scandals, and I've been embroiled in my fair share of conflicts through campus politics. What I've noticed about these battles is that they often seem to involve destructive infighting, which sees activists fighting with each other about not being radical enough. If we're thinking about radicalism in the sense of getting to the root of a concept and working out a new, more liberatory way of understanding it, then I agree that we should all strive to be more radical. But I often witness this debate devolve into anger, name-calling, and ostracism of people who are way more engaged in bringing about social change than most. And so almost every other day I spin into a crisis of meaning where I'm not sure about what I'm doing in these circles. What does it mean to practice radical democracy and then malign someone's work because it raised a new conflict even as it tried to address another? How does it build robust, democratic, pluralist community to cut people out of the debate?</p>
<p>The crux of my confusion lies in the way that people who agree on the basic premise that social inequality exists and needs to be addressed sometimes fracture themselves by fighting about how to accomplish this goal, while the seeming majority blithely naturalizes inequalities, perpetuates systemic prejudices, and authorizes the erasure of difference—all while throwing out phrases like "that's gay" with impunity. As an activist, I'm not really sure where I fit into all this, or what my purpose is.</p>
<p>Anyone else have perspectives on these tensions? I have so many more questions than answers.</p>
<p><strong>Previously:</strong> <a href="/post/looks-aint-everything-but-it-aint-bad-to-look-feminism-sexuality">Looks Ain't Everything, But it Ain't Wrong to Look</a>, <a href="/post/i-wanna-hold-your-hand">I Wanna Hold Your Hand</a></p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/activist-quandaries-and-the-benefit-of-the-doubt-feminism#commentsactivismbenefit of the doubtgrowthGSAindividual hostility vs. systemic prejudicelanguage usemusicThat's GayWhatcottSocial CommentaryWed, 29 Feb 2012 21:09:19 +0000Sharday Mosurinjohn15525 at http://bitchmagazine.orgThe Body Electric: Dear Bigots, Stop Having Children (A Rant) http://bitchmagazine.org/post/dear-bigots-stop-having-children-a-rant
<p><img width="240" src="/sites/default/files/u2846/T613-2T_1_.jpg" alt="T613-2T_1_.jpg" height="180" /></p>
<p> Dear Bigot Parents:</p>
<p>Note that I won't call you &quot;intolerant&quot; because I don't think it's about &quot;tolerance.&quot; Nobody needs to be tolerated. What needs to happen is you need to get your heads out of your asses and appreciate the rich diversity of life that exists around you. I know you don't like rich diversity, and whatever dumb reason you have to justify that--the bible tells you so (though, of course, it doesn't), your &quot;right&quot; to your own &quot;beliefs,&quot; your &quot;values,&quot; whatever--the claws really come out when there is a threat to your right to brainwash your babies into bigotry, too. I know, I know--your children must be protected! Here's the deal: your ignorance is not an excuse for the violence it causes. And I've had it with your bullshit. Your children must be protected, you're right--God save them from you. </p>
<p>So, what am I so pissed off about it? I mean, beyond the likelihood that you are the same people hell bent on preventing me from enjoying equal civil rights under the law in my partnership to the woman I have been with for five years? What's really got me mad is your reaction to the efforts of Frameline and the Gay Straight Alliance to do something that will likely save the lives and hearts of many (your own child, perhaps, among them). </p>
<p>Frameline and the Gay Straight Alliance have recently lauched a collaborative <a href="http://frameline.org/youthinmotion/gendermatters.html#descriptions" title="project" rel="nofollow">project</a> called Youth in Motion-- which offers free educational videos to schools throughout California designed to educate young people about queer issues (including the spectrum of genders that is an <strong>obvious</strong> aspect of daily life, though I do understand that the head-in-the-ass perspective is limiting for you). 250 schools have already signed up, and you can check out the curriculum (which includes discussion questions like &quot;What happens to people who don't conform to society's expectations with regard to gender and sexuality? What are they called? How are they treated?&quot;) on their website. The videos include an examination of the Native American Two Spirit people, an animated short about a boy finding the courage to wear a bikini and be himself, a father's poignant story of accepting his transgender daughter, and a story of a tomboy who goes on to become a basketball star. </p>
<p><strong>SCARY!</strong> </p>
<p>(If you want a primer on the argument against showing these videos in school, check out this obnoxious article that justifies the homophobia pretty latently <a href="http://www.examiner.com/x-22551-East-Valley-Elementary-Years--Examiner~y2009m9d29-More-Controversy-in-the-classroom" title="here" rel="nofollow">here</a> but for the blatant stuff, go ahead and check out this conservative advocacy group's <a href="http://www.pacificjustice.org/" title="campaign" rel="nofollow">campaign</a>). </p>
<p>I find you offensive. I think your &quot;right&quot; to pull your child from the classroom during the showing of these videos is a travesty, and your objections to the video being shown at all makes you an accomplice to hate. You know whose rights I'm thinking about? I'm thinking about Lawrence King, the gay eighth grader from Oxnard (in this great state of California, by the way) who was shot dead by a classmate in February. A recent <em>New York Times </em><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/23/us/23oxnard.html" title="article" rel="nofollow">article</a> quoted Masen Davis, executive director of the Transgender Law Center, as noting that the fourteen-year-old shooter &quot;is just as much a victim as Lawrence. He's a victim of homophobia and hate.'&quot; </p>
<p>Whose homophobia and hate, you ask? Why, yours! </p>
<p>How about this? If you don't like the world you live in and if you insist on your right to be toxic, move out to the middle of nowhere with a bunch of other yahoos. You can sit around all day, bathing in your homogenous, hateful righteousness. Just keep yourself away from the general public--and <strong>quit reproducing</strong>. The next generation will be so much better for it. </p>
<p>Yours sincerely, </p>
<p>Page McBee</p>
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/dear-bigots-stop-having-children-a-rant#commentsFramelineGSAThe Body ElectricYouth in MotionSocial CommentaryThu, 01 Oct 2009 04:01:44 +0000Page McBee2281 at http://bitchmagazine.org